Ken’s tax troubles – unlike his tax bill – continue to grow. As we report today, the legendary progressive was taken to court twice in the 1990s for non-payment of taxes and now faces a new HMRC investigation into his “exotic” (Nick Clegg) current tax arrangements. KenCo has been setting his election expenses against tax, effectively getting the taxpayer to subsidise his campaign. This, not surprisingly, is against the rules.

It’s all Ken, Ken, Ken. He continues,

In a fascinating sign of the panic the story is causing in Camp Ken, their first action when I put it to them yesterday was to leak a “pre-buttal” to Sunny Hundal, the sole blogger still bravely left on the burning deck of Ken’s tax arrangements. Give that man a (posthumous) VC! KenCo claims, through Sunny, that since he hasn’t filed his 2011/12 accounts yet, he can’t be accused of setting disallowable expenses against tax. Let me point out, as gently as I can, that Ken’s official campaign started in September 2010, within the scope of the accounts he has filed. And that Ken has at least three times in the last week alone (here, here and here) explicitly admitted setting campaign expenses against tax.

You know for someone who is supposedly an investigative journalist with a quality paper, Gilligoon’s blogs are little more than tabloid tittle-tattle. This paragraph is revealing because he manages to drag in Liberal Conspiracy’s Sunny Hundal who wrote,

Read carefully what Gilligan said originally and what he’s saying now.

His [Gilligan’s] original piece said: “In three years, however, he has now channelled total earnings of £755,778 through the company, putting him comfortably in the top 1 per cent of all earners.”

That says Ken earned over £775k over three years. In his reply, he now says he got the £775k figure by adding the amounts invoiced. But that does not mean Ken earned that money personally.

Notice the difference?

That was the proverbial red rag to Kennite, who shot back with,

Sunny’s also claimed that I’ve been “lifting out-of-context quotes posted by the [tax avoidance campaigner] Richard Murphy on [his] blog” in the story. Richard’s quotes in the story aren’t in fact the same as those he posted, and aren’t out of context – for the simple reason that I didn’t lift them from anywhere; he actually gave them to me over the phone when we spoke on Friday. I’ve also been attacked for citing a figure for tax avoided – a highly conservative £50k – which has been accepted even by Ken himself.

Gilligan is miffed that Hundal had managed to throw the first punch on Saturday by pre-empting today’s first blog. Sniff. It’s all too much for the wee fella. Sobs…

To bolster his ‘case’, Kennite reproduces a letter from Matthew Elliot of the Taxdodgers’ Alliance. It’s a big mistake. At once, the facade is blown away to reveal nothing more than a shameless vendetta,

The Taxpayers’ Alliance has strong connections with the Conservative Party. All of the TPA founders were affiliated with the Conservatives’ prior to setting up the TPA and both the TPA and the Conservative Party share many of the same key financial backers. Part of the TPA’s work can be understood to be an extension of the Eurosceptic element within and on the right of the Conservative Party; there are also links between the TPA and UKIP. The TPA also share close connections with the Stockholm Network and a host of other free market think tanks many of who are also part of Montgomerie and Elliott’s ‘conservative movement’.

So the TPA, like all the other self-styled non-partisan organizations, is another Tory front. Kennite, who labours under the illusion that because the TPA claims to be “non-partisan”, it is therefore best placed to conduct a fair investigation. But such an oversight has left Gilligan horribly exposed…though he seems to lack the self-awareness to realize that this is the case. But for all the TPA’s protests on behalf of Gilligan, one of its own directors, Andrew Heath, does not pay any tax. The TPA is hardly in any position to lecture anyone on tax avoidance.

At the time of writing, the blog about Ken’s tax affairs has only attracted 48 comments.

Kennite knows he needs to attract more comments. He’s lagging behind the Torygraph blog’s pack leader, James Delingpole. It simply will not do.

When all else fails, reach for the shotgun marked “Islamism” and the rest will fall into place.

And so it has.

As I write, the second blog has attracted 265 comments, the majority of which are from the usual crowd of anti-Jihadist headbangers. Give the audience what it wants. No?

I’ll skip most of the blog because it’s the final paragraph that is supposed to be the clincher,

In his last sermon, delivered in the valley of Mount Arafat, near Mecca in 632 AD, the Prophet Mohammed attacked discrimination, saying that “a white has no superiority over a black nor a black has any superiority over white, except by piety and good action.” However, he also said that men had a right to ensure their wives “do not make friends with anyone of whom you do not approve.”

I’ve been following Gilligan for nearly two years – not in a creepy, stalker kind of way, you understand – and in that time he has written scores of blogs about Livingstone the Islamist, Livingstone the Islamist sympathizer, Livingstone the anti-Semite, Livingstone the Nazi, Livingstone the newt-fancier. You get the picture.

When he isn’t grinding his “I hate Ken” axe, he’s laying into Tower Hamlets council, which he suggests is a hotbed of Islamic ‘extremism’. Occasionally, he unites his two hate-figures into a single blog. Well, it saves time. Right?

But then again, it’s what we’ve come to expect from him. He’s the gift that keeps on giving.

UPDATE: 19/3/12 @ 2358

I see Gilly’s stablemate, Ed West, is getting in on the “smear Ken” act. It’s a case of monkey see, monkey do at Canary Wharf. I also see that the comments are “closed” on his blog. What are you trying to tell us, Eddie?